Alright…
Who has done them and what differences did you see driving? Some people swear it makes the truck feel good again and it does increase MPG.
Truck weighs 5890lbs in current pics. Jumping to a 34in tire next week.
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Interesting to see your truck build weight. I’d say the re-gear is warranted. A brake upgrade possibly too. Not sure about driveability.
Peace.
GVWR is 5600…
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I just put in 4.88s in my Tacoma. I don’t anticipate going larger than 33” tires, so that seemed more appropriate. I’m approaching the end of the gear break in period and have already noticed a ~2 mpg increase for around town driving. IMO, drivability in the mountains is significantly improved.
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This is actually “light” for most tacomas. Front bumper is aluminum, aluminum skids, and NOTHING in the bed besides the GFC. Only steel on the truck is the sliders.
5890 is also with all my camping gear loaded into the truck.
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I did the same thing. Love it. Also tuned to fix the shift points.
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Yeah, tacomas are not ideal for dedicated camper rigs with a GVWR of 5600. Glad you listed your weight. I’d like to see others do that as well. I suspect that you are correct that your rig is lighter than most tacoma builds. Mine is light at 5740 with all recovery and camping gear, but without camping supplies like cooler, ice, food, beer, water, etc. Add another 100-150 lbs for that. The truck itself is stock AF. I’ve added a front bumper with winch, sliders, GFC, and cargo space for recovery and camp gear. Sometimes, I need the jerrycan. I doubt I’ll re-gear, but I may upgrade those brakes.
Peace.
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Here is a good example:
Oh, yeah. I was sitting in the truck at 5740 with full tank of gas. Its all about perspective. That guy in the video was stoked his rig only weighed in at around 6600. I’d like to trim off about 100 or so from my build. Ha!
Peace.
It blows my mind that people are still putting FWC campers on the tacomas. I’d probably want to shoot myself with how it drove afterwards.
Ha! I drive mine like the slug it is. I’m generally not in any hurry.
Peace.
IMO I’m on 33’s 4.88’s are perfect. Great improvement also tuned . Freeway rpm’s at 70mph is 2k. Keeping my build as light as possible. I purchased just the topper with beef bars.mpg’s went up like 2. I drive like a grandpa.
On 34s (285/75/17) with 5.29s and also tuned. Have rock sliders and a CBI rear bumper/swing out/full size spare. Unsure of current weight but it’s up there. I average 13-14mpg. I can’t imagine a big difference (power or mpg) if I went 4.88s.
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^^ Similar setup as you, but with 285/75/17 Geolander MTs and 5.29’s with KDMax tune…
Before 5.29’s averaging around 11mpg but was scary going up mountains and hitting 5-6k rpms…
Now I’m at a steady 13-14mpg no matter where I go and RPMs are normal. 5.29’s are good, but I think the tune WITH the 5.29 is where the magic happens.
My issue now are brakes and sway…really feeling all this weight. Going to look at powerbrake kit next.
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Do you have a pic of your build?
Pic of your build by chance?
Sounds like gears alone don’t make a huge difference but as soon as you pair it with a tune, that’s when the magic happens
That was my experience, yes. After getting the 5.29’s I drove about 1,000 miles, around 2-3 weeks and then got the tune.
After the tune is when it really started to work together and when the gear hunting and rpms really started to be normal/stock like. The tune was specific to 34’s and 5.29’s.
Not pictured is the rear bumper. If I remember correctly, CBI advertised it as weighing 300lbs of steel… yup.
So you noticed a decent difference stock vs 5.29s?